Elliot Page denounces Alberta legislation on transgender youth

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Actor Elliot Page didn’t hold back Sunday afternoon when asked to comment on Alberta’s controversial policies on transgender youth at the Calgary Expo.

Moderator Mike Morrison asked Page directly about politics in Alberta at the BMO Center in Stampede Park on the final day of the Expo.

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The UCP government introduced sweeping changes regarding children and LGBTQ rights in January, including bans on gender reassignment surgery for those under 17 and hormone therapy for children 15 and under. as well as limits on the sports participation of transgender athletes. The government also requires that parents be notified and sign up in each case where a teacher intends to give formal instruction on gender identity, sexual orientation, or human sexuality. It will also require parental notification and consent for a school to change the name or pronouns of a child 15 years old or younger.

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The legislation has been denounced not only by activists and artists but also by doctors, nurses and medical associations, including the Canadian Pediatric Society and the Alberta Medical Association. On Sunday, the question came up shortly after a man in the audience asked Page for advice for “parents of trans kids.”

“First of all, it’s horrible,” Page said of Alberta’s policies. “It is harmful. It comes from misinformation and lies about our healthcare, our lives, and who we are. These are policies that go against the advice of the Alberta Medical Association and the Canadian Pediatric Society. Seriously, this has serious impacts on people’s lives, on the father you just saw and his daughter and all the people who are simply trying to live their lives, thrive and grow in safe environments.

“The first time I tried to talk about my sexuality when I was 15, my mom, who is so supportive and amazing now, said, ‘Yeah, that doesn’t exist.’ Forcibly exposing children to their parents, taking away any kind of ability to be themselves, especially when backed by major medical institutions, is atrocious. “It’s horrible.”

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Sunday’s chat with Page, an Oscar-nominated actor who revealed he was transgender in December 2020, included several touching moments. That included not only the man who asked for advice about his trans son, but also three audience members who were transitioning and thanked Page for being an inspiration. Another fan said that the example of Page and his character Viktor in the Netflix superhero series The Umbrella Academy, who also came out as a trans man in season 3, helped his stepfather accept them. One audience member asked directly what it was like to be “an inspiration to queer kids.”

“When I know in my life the pain I felt, the discomfort, the struggle, not being able to see a future despite all the privileges that my life has allowed me, the resources to access, etc., I think that if perhaps in my trip or my wake is capable of connecting with someone, making them feel less alone on any level, making them reflect or have any kind of hope, that means more than movies. . . Why be alive if you can’t embrace interconnectedness and know that you can help someone in some way thrive and live their life? he said.

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Page, who was born and raised in Halifax, just wrapped the fourth and final season of The Umbrella Academy, a series created by Edmonton native Steve Blackman and based on the comics by Gerard Way. Page’s character began as Vanya Hargreeves, a violinist with occult powers who is estranged from his siblings who have more obvious supernatural abilities. In the third season, he comes out as a trans man to correspond with Page’s own transition.

“To have gotten that place in my life was pretty extraordinary,” Page said. “Steve Blackman, who is the showrunner, is one of the first people I told because we were going to reshoot and I wanted to have surgery and all that stuff. That he was actually the one who took the initiative to make it part of the program and everything obviously meant a lot to me.”

‘Now I get to work and I feel alive’

The discussion touched on other aspects of Page’s long career in film and television, including a brief chat about how Page landed a recurring role on Trailer Park Boys, where she played Jim Lahey’s daughter. Audience members also asked about lesser-known films, such as 2007’s harrowing An American Crime, which was based on a true story of horrific abuse, and 2005’s Hard Candy, where Page played a teenager who traps and tortures a man she believes is a sexual predator. .

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He was also asked about the 2013 video game Beyond: Two Souls, which featured a motion capture performance by the actor, and the 2019 documentary There’s Something in the Water, which Page co-directed with Ian Daniel and focused on environmental racism in Not going. Scotland, or the “disproportionate location of landfills, dams or polluting industries next to black and indigenous communities,” he said.

In his 2023 memoir, Pageboy, the actor wrote about his experiences in Alberta while filming Christopher Nolan’s 2010 sci-fi epic Inception, writing that he developed shingles due to anxiety about feeling out of place in a cast full of men. cis. In the book, he noted that it was a “delight” to work with the cast, which included Leonardo DiCaprio, Tom Hardy and Joseph Gordon-Levitt, and Nolan, which he reiterated Sunday when asked if he had any happy memories of be. In the set.

“The job, at least, allowed me to get out of my apartment,” Page said. “It was a great group of people to work with, everywhere. (I was doing) extremely fun things like learning to scuba dive so I could film the scene where the van goes into the water. I enjoyed all these things very much. Being on set and performing it was fun. The hard times were because I didn’t really feel alive when I worked. Now I get to work and I feel alive.”

— With files from Postmedia News

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